More than 1,300 tubes that carry radioactive water inside the San Onofre nuclear plant in Southern California are so damaged that they will be
taken out of service, the utility that runs the plant said Tuesday.

The figures released by Southern California Edison are the latest disclosure in a probe of equipment problems that have kept the coastal plant
sidelined for more than three months.

At issue has been the integrity of tubing that snakes through the plant's four steam generators, which were installed in a multimillion-dollar
makeover in 2009 and 2010.

Am I understanding this correctly ?

These tubes are only 2 or 3 years old and already "Damaged" ?

some wisdom from the company:

"There is no timeline on nuclear safety," Edison President Ron Litzinger said.

Well I for one am REAL happy to hear that
from you !

And,

"It seems that these new steam generators are falling apart and Edison doesn't know why. It would be foolhardy to restart, even at reduced
power, under the current circumstances," said Daniel Hirsch, a nuclear watchdog who lectures on nuclear policy at the University of California, Santa
Cruz.

Wshewww -- I'm glad somebody's smart !

I wonder Who the "Corrupted" material came from ??

If I didn't know any better,

I might think we have a bungled "cost cutting" boondoggle on our hands !

Anything that touches the radiation becomes radioactive.
So why don't we store the particles in batteries.
Because there is so much power we can't use it all.
So we use dumb power instead of free power we have too much of.
However on demand radiation does exist and is not allowed.

... Each of the generators has nearly 10,000 tubes, and the number retired is well within the limit allowed to continue operation.

... The company is drafting a plan under which the reactors would run at reduced power, at least for several months, because engineers believe that
will solve a problem with vibration that the company believes has been causing unusual wear in the alloy tubing.

So the company thinks vibration is causing the wear? Perhaps the wear is causing cavitation which in turn can cause the vibration. Hydroelectric
plants experience wear from cavitation within the impellers, and that's with ambient temperature water.

I don't know if it needs to be banned... But I agree it shouldn't be used as it is. All we do is boil water with it... Surely there is a better way to
use nuclear power, we just haven't figured it out yet.

The more nuclear power disasters we have, hopefully the quicker we can get rid of that dangerous, out moded form of technology. The ban on
photovoltaic solar cells over 22% efficiency needs to be destroyed. We have cells that are close to 40% efficiency. With that, their is high
probability we could power ourselves solely on tidal, wind and solar energies.

Not trying to burst a bubble but it's been posted... it happened 1 or 2 months back....Other
Thread

(NO ALARM WENT OFF BY THE WAY!!!)

You want to know what the sick part is... in the last 10 - 15 years they've spent a billion+ dollars to keep those decrepit "tits" from crumbling (and
yes they look like tits).... instead of trying to innovate the world by investing in one or all of these alternative clean energies...

1. Wave/Tidal Generation: The thing sits right on the beach... why not expand, test and prove efficiency of wave/tidal electric generation.

2. Geothermal Generation: Just east of the San Onofre facility lays a literal hot bed of hot springs (The power lines even go off in that
direction)

3. Hydrogen Energy Generation: I bring this up because they could also establish a desalination plant to begin mass production so California is not so
dependent on the Colorado River (But NooOOoooOooo they'd rather establish a "Toilet to Tap" system)

Just my 2 copper coins

edit on 9-5-2012 by FORMe2p00p0n because: I stepped in a big pile of radioactive dog turds

Keep in mind that the "coolant" from the reactors is what heats the "clean" side water into steam for use in the turbines to produce power. Holes
in the tubes would allow the reactor coolant to leak into the "clean" side.

Seems that the Nuclear PTB dont really care about the "risks, long term and short term" in regards to Nuclear Power. Are the Super Computers not
being inputed with the right scenarios?? How many more NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS are we to take??

I'd almost be willing to bet that somebody in charge of plant chemistry there is looking at the help wanted ads. Or at least they should be. Tubes
typically just don't fail for no reason en masse like that.

Contaminants that seem negligible in most water systems are a whole different story when dealing with 600°F 600PSI superheated water. Also keeping
minimal turbidity and a neutral pH is serious business. Etching/erosion, embrittlement, and various other forms of corrosion are greatly accelerated
under plant conditions. Or at least that's a little bit I remember from many years ago. (Was a machinist's for a while, until I decided I wanted to
do something else.)

If it breached into the primary, then it could be really bad. Because whatever was eating the pipes (not just the tubes) in the secondary could get
into the fuel rods. (Reactor/primary should be at a higher pressure to limit that. In theory at least. Now in practice?)

Whatever it is, we can all agree that it shouldn't have happened in the first place. Then again, that's just stating the obvious.

Why as a race are we not thinking and exploring alternatives that may produce energy outputs?
(Yes I know it is an old article, but what have people/government been doing?) Why not look at
alternatives?

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